We shall supplement our comparison of the theory of romanticism on the main points of contemporary economy with scientific theory by comparing their judgments on one practical question. The interest of such a comparison is heightened by the fact that this practical question represents one of the largest, principled questions of capitalism, on the one hand; on the other hand, by the fact that on this question both the most prominent representatives of these hostile theories have expressed their views.

We speak of the Corn Laws in England and their repeal {66}. This question deeply interested, in the second quarter of the present century, not only English economists but Continental ones as well: all understood that this was by no means a particular question of tariff policy, but a general question concerning freedom of trade, freedom of competition, concerning the "fate of capitalism." The matter was precisely this: to crown the edifice of capitalism with the complete realization of freedom of competition, to clear the way for the completion of that "destruction" which large-scale machine industry had begun to carry out in England from the end of the previous century, to remove the obstacles retarding this "destruction" in agriculture. This is precisely how both Continental economists, of whom we are about to speak, viewed this question.

Sismondi inserted into the second edition of his *Nouveaux Principes* a special chapter "on laws concerning the trade in grain" (I. III, ch. X).

He first of all establishes the burning character of the question: "Half of the English people now demands the repeal of the Corn Laws, demands it with deep irritation against those who support them; and the other half demands their preservation, uttering cries of indignation against those who wish to repeal them" (I, 251).

In analyzing the question, Sismondi points out that the interests of English farmers require a tariff on grain to assure them a remunerating price (a profitable or break-even price). The interests of manufacturers, on the other hand, require the repeal of the Corn Laws, for manufactures cannot exist without foreign markets, and the further development of English exports was retarded by laws restricting imports: "The manufacturers said that the saturation of the market, which they encounter at the points of sale, is the result of those same Corn Laws – that wealthy people on the Continent cannot buy their goods, for they find no market for their grain" (I, 254) [156].

"The opening of markets to foreign grain will ruin, probably, English landowners and reduce rents to an incomparably lower price. This is a great misfortune, without doubt, but it would not be unjust" (I, 254). And Sismondi proceeds in the most naive manner to prove that the income of landowners ought to correspond to the service (sic!! [157]) which they render to "society" (capitalist?) and so forth. "Farmers," Sismondi continues, "will withdraw their capital – at least in part – from agriculture."

In this argument of Sismondi's (and he contents himself with this argument) is revealed the fundamental vice of romanticism, which does not pay sufficient attention to the process of economic development actually taking place. We have seen that Sismondi himself pointed to the gradual development and growth of farming in England. But he hastens to proceed to condemning this process instead of studying its causes. Only this haste, the desire to impose upon history his innocent wishes, can explain the circumstance that Sismondi overlooks the general tendency of capitalist development in agriculture and the inevitable acceleration of this process upon the repeal of the Corn Laws, that is, capitalist progress in agriculture instead of the decline which Sismondi prophesies.

But Sismondi remains true to himself. As soon as he encounters the contradiction of this capitalist process, he immediately resorts to naive "refutation" of it, striving at all costs to prove the erroneousness of the path upon which "English fatherland" is proceeding.

"What will the day laborer do? .. Work will cease, fields will be turned into pasture… What will become of the 540,000 families who will be refused work? [158] Assuming even that they will be fit for all industrial work, is there at present any industry capable of accepting them? .. Will there be such a government which would voluntarily decide to subject half of the nation under its rule to such a crisis? .. Those for whom the agriculturists will thus be sacrificed, will they themselves derive any benefit from this? After all, these agriculturists are the closest and most reliable consumers of English manufactures. The cessation of their consumption would deal industry a more ruinous blow than the closing of one of the largest foreign markets" (255–256). The notorious "reduction of the internal market" makes its appearance. "How much will manufactures lose from the cessation of consumption of the whole class of English agriculturists, which constitutes almost half of the nation? How much will manufactures lose from the cessation of consumption of wealthy people, whose land-owning incomes will be almost annihilated?" (267). The romantic stretches himself to the utmost, trying to prove to the manufacturers that the contradictions inherent in the development of their production and their wealth express only their error, their miscalculation. And in order to "convince" the manufacturers of the "danger" of capitalism, Sismondi paints in detail the threatening competition of Polish and Russian grain (p. 257–261). He brings all manner of arguments into play, even seeks to appeal to the vanity of Englishmen. "What will become of England's honor if the Russian emperor is able, whenever he wishes to obtain some concession from her, to starve her into submission by closing the ports of the Baltic Sea?" (268). Remember, reader, how Sismondi proved the erroneousness of the "apology for the power of money" by pointing out that deception often occurs in sales… Sismondi wishes to "refute" the theoretical exponents of farming by pointing out that wealthy farmers cannot withstand competition from wretched peasants (cited above), and in the end he arrives precisely at his favorite conclusion, convinced apparently that he has proven the "erroneousness" of the path upon which "English fatherland" is proceeding. "The example of England shows us that this practice (the development of monetary economy, to which Sismondi counteroposes *l'habitude de se fournir soi-même*, "life by the labor of one's own hands") is not without danger" (263). "The system of economy itself (namely, farming) is bad, is founded on a dangerous basis, and it is this that should be attempted to be changed" (266).

The concrete question, occasioned by the clash of definite interests in a definite economic system, is drowned, thus, in a flood of innocent wishes! But the question was posed by the interested parties themselves so sharply that it became altogether impossible to satisfy oneself with such a "solution" (as romanticism satisfies itself with it regarding all other questions).

"But what is to be done, however," asks Sismondi in despair, "should the ports of England be opened or closed? should the manufacturing or agricultural workers of England be condemned to hunger and death? Truly, a terrible question; the position in which the English ministry finds itself is one of the most ticklish in which statesmen could possibly find themselves" (260). And Sismondi again and again returns to the "general conclusion" about the "danger" of the system of farming, about the "danger of subordinating all agriculture to a system of speculation." But "in what manner can such measures be adopted in England – serious, but at the same time gradual, which would restore the significance (*remettraient en honneur*) of small farms, when half the nation, occupied in manufactures, suffers from hunger, and the measures demanded by it threaten hunger to the other half of the nation, occupied in agriculture – I do not know. I consider it necessary to subject the laws concerning the trade in grain to considerable changes; but I advise those who demand complete repeal of them to carefully examine the following questions" (267) – there follow the old complaints and apprehensions concerning the decline of agriculture, the reduction of the internal market, and so forth.

Thus, at the very first encounter with reality, romanticism suffered complete fiasco. It was forced to issue to itself a *testimonium paupertatis* [159] and personally to sign for its receipt. Remember how easily and simply romanticism "resolved" all questions in "theory"! Protectionism – is irrational, capitalism – is a ruinous delusion, the path of England – is erroneous and dangerous, production ought to keep pace with consumption, industry and trade – in step with agriculture, machines are beneficial only when they lead to an increase in wages or a reduction in the working day, means of production ought not to be separated from the producers, exchange ought not to outpace production, ought not to lead to speculation, and so forth, and so forth. Every contradiction romanticism stuffed with the corresponding sentimental phrase, every question it answered with the corresponding innocent wish, and affixing these labels to all the facts of current life it called "resolving" the questions. No wonder that these resolutions were so touchingly simple and easy: they ignored only one small circumstance – those real interests, in the conflict of which the contradiction itself consisted. And when the development of this contradiction placed the romantic face to face before one of such particularly acute conflicts as was the struggle of parties in England preceding the repeal of the Corn Laws – our romantic completely lost himself. He felt perfectly at home in the fog of dreams and good wishes, he so skillfully composed sentiments suitable for "society" in general (but unsuitable for any historically determined social order) – and when he found himself drawn from his world of fantasy into the whirlpool of actual life and the clash of interests – he had in his hands not even a criterion for resolving concrete questions. The habit of abstract constructions and abstract solutions reduced the question to a bare formula: which population should be ruined, agricultural or manufacturing? – And the romantic could not, of course, but conclude that neither should be ruined, that one ought to "turn aside from the path"… but real contradictions had already hemmed him in so tightly that they do not allow him to rise again into the fog of good wishes, and the romantic is forced to give an answer. Sismondi gave even two answers: the first – "I do not know"; the second – "on the one hand, one cannot but admit, on the other hand, one must acknowledge" {67}.

On the 9th of January, 1848, in Brussels, Karl Marx delivered a "speech on free trade" [160] at a public assembly. In opposition to romanticism, which declared that "political economy is not a science of calculation but a science of morality," he made simple sober calculation of interests his point of departure. Instead of regarding the question of the Corn Laws as a question of the "system" chosen by a nation, or as a question of legislation (as Sismondi regarded it), the speaker began by representing this question as a clash of the interests of manufacturers and landowners and demonstrated how English manufacturers attempted to present the question as a matter of common concern to all, attempted to convince workers that they were acting in the interests of the common good. In opposition to the romantic, who presented the question in the form of considerations which the legislator ought to keep in mind in carrying out the reform – the speaker reduced the question to the clash of real interests of different classes of English society. He showed the necessity of cheapening raw materials for manufacturers as the foundation of the entire question. He characterized the distrustful attitude of English workers, who saw in "men full of self-denial, in someone like Bowring, Bright and their companions – their greatest enemies."

"The manufacturers build at great expense palaces in which the Anti-Corn-Law-League {68} establishes, in a sense, its residence, they send out to all parts of England a whole army of apostles to preach the religion of free trade. They print in thousands of copies pamphlets and distribute them free of charge to enlighten the worker as to his own interests. They spend enormous sums to win the press to their side. To guide the free-trade movement, they organize a magnificent administrative apparatus and display at public meetings all the gifts of their eloquence. At one of these meetings a worker exclaimed: 'If the landowners were selling our bones, then you, manufacturers, would be the first to buy them in order to send them to a steam mill and make flour out of them!'. The English workers understood perfectly well the significance of the struggle between landowners and manufacturers. They know perfectly well that the price of grain is being reduced in order to reduce wages, and that the profit on capital will rise by the same amount as rent falls" {69}.

Thus, the very formulation of the question is presented in an altogether different manner than in Sismondi. The task is set, firstly, to explain the attitude of different classes of English society to the question from the point of view of their interests; secondly, to illuminate the significance of the reform in the general evolution of English social economy.

On this latter point the views of the speaker coincide with those of Sismondi in that he likewise sees here not a particular, but a general question concerning the development of capitalism in general, concerning "free trade" as a system. "The repeal of the Corn Laws in England was the greatest triumph which free trade achieved in the XIX century" {70}. "With the repeal of the Corn Laws, free competition, the contemporary system of social economy, is brought to its extreme development" [161]. This question appears, consequently, for these authors to be a question of whether the further development of capitalism should be desired or whether it should be retarded, whether other paths ought to be sought, and so forth. And we know that their affirmative answer to this question was precisely the solution of the general principled question of the "fates of capitalism," not a particular question about the Corn Laws in England, inasmuch as the point of view established here was applied much later in relation to other states as well. The authors held such views in the 1840s both with respect to Germany and with respect to America [162], declaring the progressiveness of free competition for that country; with respect to Germany, even in the 1860s one of them wrote that it suffered not only from capitalism, but also from insufficient development of capitalism {71}.

Let us return to the exposition of this speech. We have pointed to the principally different point of view of the speaker, who reduced the question to the interests of different classes of English society. We see an equally profound difference in his formulation of the purely theoretical question concerning the significance of the repeal of the Corn Laws in social economy. For him this is not an abstract question about what system England ought to follow, what path it ought to choose (as Sismondi poses the question, forgetting that England has a past and a present which already determine this path). No, he poses the question at once on the ground of the given social-economic order; he asks himself what the next step should be in the development of this order after the repeal of the Corn Laws.

The difficulty of this question consisted in determining how the repeal of the Corn Laws would affect agriculture – for as regards industry, this influence was clear to everyone.

In order to prove the utility of such repeal also for agriculture, the Anti-Corn-Law-League offered prizes for the three best essays on the beneficial influence of the abolition of the Corn Laws on English agriculture. The speaker briefly expounds the views of all three laureates, Hope, Morse, and Greg, and immediately singles out the last, whose essay is most scientific, most strictly conducts the principles established by classical political economy.

Greg, himself a major manufacturer, writing chiefly for large farmers, proves that the repeal of the Corn Laws will drive small farmers out of agriculture, who will turn to industry, but will serve to the advantage of large farmers, who will obtain the possibility of leasing land for longer periods, investing more capital in land, using more machines, making do with a smaller quantity of labor, which ought to become cheaper with the cheapening of grain. Landowners, on the other hand, will have to content themselves with lower rent, owing to the withdrawal from cultivation of lands of poor quality, incapable of withstanding competition from cheap imported grain.

The speaker proved entirely correct in recognizing this prediction as most scientific and as an open defense of capitalism in agriculture. History vindicated the prediction. "The repeal of the Corn Laws gave English agriculture an enormous impetus… An absolute diminution of the rural working population proceeded hand in hand with an expansion of the cultivated area, with intensification of culture, with an unprecedented accumulation of capital invested in land and devoted to its cultivation, with an increase in land product having no parallel in the history of English agronomy, with an increase in the rent of landowners, with the growth of the wealth of capitalist tenants… The fundamental condition of the new methods was a greater expenditure of capital per acre of land, and consequently, accelerated concentration of farms" [163].

But the speaker did not, of course, limit himself merely to this recognition of the greatest correctness of Greg's reasoning. This reasoning, in Greg's mouth, was an argument of a free trader, discoursing about English agriculture in general, striving to prove the general advantage to the nation of the repeal of the Corn Laws. From what we have set forth above, it is clear that such was not the view of the speaker.

He clarified that the reduction in the price of grain, so much praised by free traders, means the inevitable reduction of wages, the cheapening of the commodity "labor" (more precisely: of labor power); that the cheapening of grain will never be able to compensate for the worker this reduction in wages, firstly, because with the reduction in the price of grain it will be more difficult for the worker to make savings on grain consumption in order to afford the purchase of other articles; secondly, because the progress of industry cheapens articles of consumption, replacing beer with vodka, grain with potato, wool and flax with cotton, thereby lowering the level of the worker's needs and life.

Thus, we see that the speaker establishes the elements of the question, apparently, in the same way as Sismondi: he too recognizes as an inevitable consequence of free trade the ruin of small farmers, the poverty of workers in industry and in agriculture. Our Populists, distinguished also by their unparalleled skill at "citing," stop precisely here in their customary "excerpts," declaring with full satisfaction that they are completely "in agreement." But such methods show only that they do not understand, in the first place, the enormous differences in the formulation of the question which we have pointed to above; that they overlook, in the second place, the circumstance that the fundamental distinction of the new theory from romanticism begins precisely here: the romantic turns away from the concrete questions of actual development to dreams, while the realist takes the established facts as the criterion for a definite solution to a concrete question.

After pointing to the forthcoming improvement in the situation of workers, the speaker continued:

"Do not think, however, gentlemen, that in criticizing free trade we intend to defend the protective system" {73}. And the speaker pointed to the identical foundation of free trade and protectionism in the contemporary system of social economy, pointed briefly to that process of "destruction" of the old economic life and old semi-patriarchal relations in Western European states which capitalism was carrying out in England and on the Continent, pointed to that social fact that, under certain conditions, free trade accelerates this "destruction" [165]. "And so, gentlemen," the speaker concluded, "only in this sense do I cast my vote for freedom of trade" {74}.